I Hope You Find Me Read online

  I Hope You Find Me

  By Trish Marie Dawson

  Copyright 2012 Trish Marie Dawson

  Amazon Edition

  For Shane, Rory and Foxx. This is for you.

  TABLE of CONTENTS

  TABLE of CONTENTS

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  CHAPTER ONE

  I can’t remember now how long their bodies burned but I do remember the sun setting before it was over, not far off in the distance, just beyond the still and dismal outline of downtown San Diego. Its flame-colored glare hit the Pacific Ocean and slowly, steadily, melted beyond the horizon as smoke drifted up in dark gray coils into the sky. The fleeing sun took the heat away with it, and as the first stars of the night made their appearance, the crisp chill of January returned.

  Ash settled all around me, resting on my eyelashes and the tip of my nose…threatening to choke the oxygen from my lungs. I kept vigil over my dead family while I sat at the edge of the garden, slumped forward with my legs crossed and my hands resting loosely in my lap. A steady breeze from the approaching night collided with the draft from the fire, sending hot gusts of air in my direction. My face and arms stung from the warmth but the smell was worse than the heat. The strong odor of burning flesh kept my nostrils flared and stomach turning.

  I knew that day it was true what they say; one can never forget the smell of a dead body. I know, I’ll never forget.

  ***

  After spending several days in bed crying, my broken heart didn’t actually kill me like I had hoped it would. The weather felt cold and gloomy when I finally climbed out from under the covers and stumbled into the bathroom. I turned the water faucet on, but the tap was dry and for the first time that week, a stab of panic spread through my chest at the irony that I could die after-all…from thirst or hunger.

  I blinked in confusion at the harried reflection in the oval mirror staring blankly back at me. The porcelain counter-top felt cool beneath my weak fingers as I leaned forward and stared at the hollow expression of the girl that resembled me. Her blue eyes seemed trapped in a stormy darkness, and the circles below them made her cheeks appear sunken in…completely defeated. Long, blonde hair hung from her scalp in greasy and knotted strands, having lost its luster.

  I blinked again and pushed off the sink, wanting nothing more but to run away from that girl in the mirror, and my elbow grazed a small drinking glass, knocking it over the edge of the countertop. I gasped when it shattered on the white tile floor and watched, mesmerized, as a shard spun wildly away from my feet until it hit the edge of the fluffy blue bathmat, and bounced to a stop. I stared at the broken remnants of the glass with fascination, before I slowly reached down to pick up the large sliver that had nestled against the side of the mat, and pinched it between my fingers until a small bead of blood formed on the pad of my thumb. After letting the glass fall back to the floor, I rubbed the blood between my fingers until the warm fluid began to stick to my skin. Outside, the clouds parted briefly and sunshine teased behind the curtains, willing someone to open them, to let the light back in. When I looked back up at the mirror, it was me I saw.

  ***

  I ran my fingertips across the grain of the distressed oak dresser, leaving thin trails in the dust as I stared at the picture frames, the generous pile of my son’s miss-matched folded socks, and my wooden jewelry box. Inside the small glass door I could see the delicate necklace my daughter gave to me three years before on Mother’s Day. I reached inside and tapped the golden locket until it swayed slightly on its chain like a pendulum, before carefully shutting the glass door, locking it inside the jewelry box forever. I stood in the doorway and looked at my neat bedroom and sighed. Everything was in its place, but I felt as if I no longer fit there.

  It was the same feeling in every room I walked through, even my office, with the massive piles of school work I never got around to grading over the winter break that had snowballed out of control and spread along the desk top like weeds. A bright white piece of paper with a messy fingerprint on the right upper corner caught my eye, and I picked it up to read the name and title: Mariposa, The Happy Butterfly, by Cecy Aguirre. I read through the first paragraph about Cecy’s fictitious garden butterfly before I remembered the class assignment. My third graders had turned in a fantasy paper about their favorite insect just before the school closed for the holiday break but I hadn’t read any of them. An overwhelming sadness flooded through me, and I sat down at my desk, red pen in hand, and worked my way through the mound of papers, writing an “O” for outstanding at the top of each. When I was finished, I put the papers neatly in a stack, with Cecy’s paper right on top and moved on to a pile of math papers, and went through those too. Even the ones with wrong answers got an “O” at the top, scribbled neatly in my red grading ink.

  Afterwards, I sat at the desk with my face stretched out in a manic-like grin as I stared at the graded papers. I felt accomplished for the first time in weeks. Even though the papers would never make it back to their eight year old owners, at least they hadn’t been completely forgotten. Earlier in the morning I had showered in the tub with cold, bottled water and put on a clean change of clothes before wandering through the house, feeling detached with a million fragmented thoughts running through my mind like wild horses. But with the papers done, a brief spell of peace calmed me, and all that was left to do was sit and think.

  I pushed away the thought of starving myself by going back to bed for the next month, and because I had spent the last few years turning my house ‘green’ there wasn’t anything harsher than vinegar to poison myself with. The strongest medicine in the cabinets was a half-full bottle of syrup for colds that was acetaminophen-free. I know because I checked the label. Twice.

  And there was the dog to think about. The virus that had swept across the nation like an unchecked wildfire killing most in its path didn’t do a damn thing to me, or our four year old black mini-lab/cocker spaniel mix. I leaned back in my ergonomic office chair and looked at the small furry body at my feet. Zoey was resting on her front paws, which often served as a pillow for her whiskered chin. Even though she appeared to be sleeping, there was a ring of moisture around her closed lids. I had no tears left, but the poor dog hadn’t stopped crying.

  So I really only had one option, as difficult as it was to comprehend. I had to leave. To get as far away as possible from the life I had lost; the life that threatened to kill me slowly by driving me insane. I couldn’t walk down the long and narrow hallway between the bedrooms without hearing whispers, or feeling eyes on me. The edges of my psyche were beginning to crack, like the seams that held me together were unraveling, so I decided to go to my Mother’s apartment in the city and figure things out from there because the longer I stayed in my own house, the more alien it felt. I was afraid the walls, or something sinister living inside them, would close in around me and swallow me whole.

  Roaming through the house to pack my belongings didn’t take long. What I really wanted to take with me was in a smoldering heap in the backyard. There wasn’t much I needed other than food and water, some clothes and my little po
cket first-aid pack. I sat down at my computer with a handful of flash-drives to copy pictures and videos of the kids since that was all I could really keep of them.

  Out of habit I tried to go online but I wasn’t connected; there was no internet service. I wondered briefly if the internet still existed at all inside the satellites flying around Earth or if it died from its own silent virus along with the rest of humanity. I guess I would never know, not that it mattered. Knowing the details wouldn’t change what had happened.

  I carefully tucked the flash-drives inside a sandwich bag before double wrapping it and sealing it shut. I rolled it all up delicately and set it inside a fabric pouch labeled Tooth Fairy in silvery-pink thread and put the pouch in a zippered side pocket of my back pack, next to Cecy’s paper. For some reason, it felt good to take it with me.

  I had enough food for about three days, and water for about one. Even though I could see the skyscrapers from our living room it was at least five miles to downtown and considering we might end up walking, I packed only what I could carry.

  On our way out the door, I hesitated at the entryway where several framed pictures of our last snow trip to the mountains hung up neatly on the wall. I took down the one of the kids sitting on their sled and peered into the faces of the smiling girl and goofy grinned boy before slamming it up against the door frame. Zoey scurried away and looked at me reproachfully underneath her long dark lashes.

  “Sorry girl.” I apologized, as she carefully sat down in the driveway, anxiously waiting for me to exit the house.

  I picked the broken glass out of the frame and removed the picture, holding it in both hands. She was 8 and he was 4. They were beautiful. I folded the paper in half and slid it into the front of my backpack, next to the tooth fairy pouch and Cecy’s paper. When I shut the door behind me, I only turned around to make sure the note I wrote earlier was still firmly pinned into the red wooden door. I read the words silently, one more time.

  1/9

  Family and Friends: The dog and I have left to find my Mom. Most of you know where her place is, the corner of 9th and F. I’ll leave a note there before I move on. Everyone here is…gone. I can’t stay. I’m not sure when or if I will come back here but leave a message anyway.

  I hope you find me. – Riley

  I sighed heavily and turned around to face my dead neighbor’s brand new cherry-red Jeep Wrangler, which looked out of place parked atop the weed-filled cracks of my driveway. Before I climbed into it, I ran my hand over the white RUBICON lettering that was printed along the side of the hood. It looked straight off the dealership floor, and even though my neighbor had brought it home six months before, he had taken exceptional care of it. Even the tires still looked untouched by the road. I had broken into someone’s home, stolen their car, and honestly didn’t care. As I drove the Jeep out of the driveway, I looked at the place that held so many of my memories. It felt like a cemetery, but I didn’t see myself returning to visit any time soon.

  ***

  There weren’t many cars blocking the streets around my neighborhood but within a mile of the freeway the frozen traffic was bumper to bumper and I realized with horror and sadness that people had flocked out of their homes only to die in their cars. I couldn’t think of anything more depressing. Even with most of the windows rolled up tight, the smell of the decaying bodies wafted out of their tin coffins and surrounded the Jeep like an invisible fog, and I questioned, not for the first time, my need to go into the city.

  During the last conversation I had with my mother, she had tried to hide it, but I heard the ragged breathing and could almost feel the fever through the phone and I knew she was sick too. Before the land lines went out I called everyone I could think of. My family, friends, coworkers and even my students, but most didn’t answer their phones and the few that did were all sick. This wasn’t a cold anyone recovered from; the virus was fast and efficient, killing the infected within forty-eight hours. The National T.V. called it the Cardinal Plague but the local radio stations mostly referred to the outbreak as the Red Death. I didn’t care about the name, but it was efficient - more so than anyone could have possibly imagined.

  Almost a week had passed since the power grid went off and only the tops of a handful of buildings had emergency lights still flickering on and off. At night the whole city seemed to disappear into the darkness, and I wanted to be out of the city by nightfall. I knew my Mom would be dead by the time we made it to her apartment, but I had to know for certain - I couldn’t move on without knowing.

  Once we made it within eyesight of the freeway on-ramp it was clear I wouldn’t be able to drive into downtown from there, so I drove on side streets as parallel to the main roads as I could, slowly weaving between parked cars and driving on the sidewalks and embankments when necessary. Every street going in and out of the city was too congested to pass through freely.

  The air was cool despite the morning sun as we inched along the streets leading into downtown. Eventually vehicles blocked the way forward, and with no room to turn the Jeep around, I had to leave it wedged between a chain-link fence and an old Buick, and decided to walk the rest of the way. All we needed for the day was shoved into my large back pack but I left the extra dog food since I planned on returning to the Jeep on my way out of the city.

  Zoey looked at me as we wiggled between the cars full of rotting people. Her big, dark chocolate-brown eyes pleaded with me for answers and all I could think of to say was, “Don’t worry girl, it’s going to be okay.” But I didn’t believe my own words. When would it ever be okay again?

  The silence of the city was overwhelming; a place that was once in a constant state of activity was completely devoid of sound and movement. Even the dog felt the heavy weight from the dead buildings. Loft windows seemed to watch us with sad, glassy eyes as we hurried down the empty sidewalks toward the epicenter of San Diego and I kept our pace quick.

  We stopped at a corner and watched police tape flap about in the breeze that had been wrapped completely around a small parking lot that was full of medical vans and police vehicles. I carefully approached each car, peering inside. Every window of a plain black sedan with exempt plates had been shattered, its contents riffled through. Someone had already picked each vehicle clean. Piled up behind one of the vans was a heap of body bags, at least ten feet high, and equally as wide. I backed out of the lot before my mind had the chance to tell my stomach to purge breakfast.

  One block further and parked at an angle in the middle of the street was a military tank. Part of the store front nearest the tank was blown inward, scattering huge chunks of concrete, glass and wood dozens of feet into the street. Pieces of trash and debris had settled on the front of the massive machine and the littered look of the scene gave the impression it had been there for years, not the weeks it had taken for the city to die. We kept walking, our eyes facing forward, feet pounding the pavement as a rancid, smoky smell drifted along the wind, similar to what my own backyard smelled like…burnt corpses. I did not want to find the source.

  ***

  My Mother’s apartment was on the fourth floor of a small corner complex. I stood in the street for a full minute, debating on whether I truly wanted to go inside. I had watched my son, my ex-husband and finally my daughter, take their last breaths in my arms. I wasn’t sure if I was ready to find my Mother dead too in her small one bedroom apartment. So I stood there, staring at the entry door as if she would walk out of it at any second. With my eyes closed, I could almost hear the traffic and shouts and laughs of a once thriving public. But with my eyes open, all I could hear was my steady and slightly rushed heartbeat and the ragged panting of a nervous canine at my feet.

  A raven flew out of a nearby tree, sending a piercing caw in our direction so loud that Zoey and I both jumped. It was enough to snap me out of my semi-trance and I squared my shoulders and closed the gap between the street and the front door in ten long strides. When I tugged on the metal handle nothing happened. It didn’t budg
e. I slammed all my weight up against the frame and it rattled, but wouldn’t give. The only option was to break in. The closest thing nearby that was heavy enough to go through the tempered glass was a metal trashcan. I had to roll it on its side to move it and it took several impacts against the door to crack the glass. After kicking the broken shards out enough to pass through, the smell of decay drifted from inside the building out into the fresh air. Zoey sneezed violently and refused to enter with me.

  “Come on, girl. You can do it.” I urged her.

  She sat on the edge of the curb with a sad look, her droopy eyes moist.

  “Let’s go.” I willed her toward me, my hands patting my legs. She mocked a sneeze and glanced away from me.

  I stood with my hands on my hips, chewing nervously at my lower lip, wondering which would be less traumatic: leaving her outside, alone on the street, or carrying her unwillingly into the building and forcing her up the stairs with me. I glared at her, and just as I was about to turn and leave her sulking on the curb, a shrill scream erupted from down the street. Its echo bounced off the brick buildings with an eerie rhythm. The hairs rose on the back of my neck as I pondered briefly whether the scream was human, or animal, and Zoey’s nervous glances up and down the sidewalk gave me the answer I needed. She wasn’t staying outside without me.

  ***

  All thirty pounds of her squirmed and wiggled under my arm as I stomped up the dark stairwell, cursing under my breath as she fought against me. On the second level I let her go and she followed at my heels until we reached the fourth floor landing. We stood there, the two of us simply looking at each other. At that moment if felt as if the narrow stairwell was the portal to some unknown universe, like leaving those steps would take us to a place we couldn’t return from.